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irse
Forum Admin
India
553 Posts |
 Posted - 09/27/2009 : 04:14:43
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The first Rajdhani to be introduced over IR was on March 19, 1969 when the 101 Up Howrah-New Delhi Radhani Express was flagged off at 5 p.m from platform No. 9 of the Howrah Station. It had arrived on right time at New Delhi on 9.50 a.m the next day, after 16 hours and 50 minutes. The return train 102 Down New Delhi-Howrah Rajdhani had left at 6.15 pm arriving Howrah the next day at 1050 hrs, sixteen hours and fifty minutes later.
The 101 Up/102 Down had no commercial halt at all, meaning that only Howrah-New Delhi- Howrah tickets used to be issued for this train. It did have "technical halts" at Gomoh Junction (not Dhanbad), Mughalsarai and Kanpur for change of crew, drivers and guards, etc. No passengers could board this train at these halts which used to be run with nine coaches twice a week-five chair cars, one first class one pantry car, one brake can and one generator car. The entire train of course was air-conditioned and with all-reserved seats and berths.
A WDM-4 (broad gauge, diesel and mixed) locomotive imported from General Motors, USA used to haul this train at a maximum permissible speed (mps) of 120 kilometres per hour (kmph). The speed was raised to 130 kmph later but the timings, if one recalls correctly, were not changed. Even otherwise, Indian Railways had curiously, stuck to the mps of passenger-carrying trains to 60 miles (slightly more than 97 kilometres) an hour set by the British since 1853, which was considered a great step forward when the mps was raised to 100 kmph in 1967
The Mumbai Rajdhani was introduced in 1972 and its was considered the final step because the concept then was that the Rajdhani should be an overnight train between State capitals and the national capital and no other metropolis had qualified for this criterion for a long time. Its MPS was 120 kmph
The frequency of the Howrah-New Delhi Rajdhani was extended gradually till this train had fallen into bad days by the late 1970s. There were two factors contributing to this deterioration. First, the tracks on the route had degenerated because of lack of upgradation with times owing to paucity of funds , and even though the load was raised, there was no corresponding electric locomotive at that stage for this prestigious train.
The entire Mumbai Rajdhani routed was electrified by 1976,the Rajdhani continued to be hauled by double headed (that is two locomotives) WDM-2 diesel locos for several years.
Rajendra Saxena
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irse
Forum Admin
India
553 Posts |
Posted - 10/15/2009 : 04:51:28
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In fact, in the very beginning, the Howrah and Bombay Rajdhanis did not have any commercial halts (similar to the 'non-stop' Durontos). Later on, Kanpur, Mughalsarai, Dhanbad, Vadodara and Ratlam became commercial halts. In fact, the tech. halt at Gomoh was removed and Dhanbad became a halt. I still remember the meagre quotas in AC Chair Car for the Rajdhanis in 1986 : Kanpur 10 seats, Mughalsarai - 2/4 seats, Dhanbad - 3/4 seats, Vadodara - 10/20 seats, Ratlam - 4 seats. In fact, Surat had a quota of 10 seats only for the 151 Dn Rajdhani but passengers HAD TO TRAVEL TO VADODARA to board it. Can you imagine that? IR simply refused to provide any additional halts for the two Rajdhanis. All that changed when Howrah Rajdhani got a halt at Allahabad, courtesy Jnaneswar Misra.
Rajendra Saxena |
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Rajdhani express
